Dog hunting season starts down here in Louisiana this weekend!! Favorite time of the year, nothing like hearing those puppies run.(Except passing on does and small bucks to let that big boy finally come out). The rut starts late here, i'd say end of December. SOOO 3 weeks of mud riding, staying one step ahead of the deer and Walker hounds. Next year we get 4 weeks of dog season. Is this a southern thing? We do not grow the kind of deer yall do up north, much smaller racks and the big boys are nocturnal!!

Lots of people look away/criticize when you talk hunting deer with dogs. Sometimes it's the same people that hunt rabbits with dogs.

I think you should explain and educate why your beautiful state has this as a hunting season. Then maybe some people would accept it a little more.....and it must be a southern thing, or more than that be a more applicable hunting technique to the state/area/terrain.

And if we call it rabbit hunting with dogs, shouldn't we call it deer hunting with dogs?

I'm not familiar at all with any states that use dogs for hunting, nor am I familiar with the laws of the land as well as the reasons why it is only used in certain areas. So that's why I'm bringing all this up, as a person ignorant about this technique for hunting deer.

In Indiana, we are now allowed to use dogs(on a leash) to help us track game for recovery purposes.

Lots of people look away/criticize when you talk hunting deer with dogs. Sometimes it's the same people that hunt rabbits with dogs.

I think you should explain and educate why your beautiful state has this as a hunting season. Then maybe some people would accept it a little more.....and it must be a southern thing, or more than that be a more applicable hunting technique to the state/area/terrain.

And if we call it rabbit hunting with dogs, shouldn't we call it deer hunting with dogs?

I'm not familiar at all with any states that use dogs for hunting, nor am I familiar with the laws of the land as well as the reasons why it is only used in certain areas. So that's why I'm bringing all this up, as a person ignorant about this technique for hunting deer.

In Indiana, we are now allowed to use dogs(on a leash) to help us track game for recovery purposes.

LOVE It! or should i say loved it we use to run dogs here in northern va a few years back but everything just grew up too much dogs kept getting killed by cars. Still alot of people do it around here. i watch the videos online to get a fix sometimes. hearing them dogs coming what a rush.

Lots of people look away/criticize when you talk hunting deer with dogs. Sometimes it's the same people that hunt rabbits with dogs.

I think you should explain and educate why your beautiful state has this as a hunting season. Then maybe some people would accept it a little more.....and it must be a southern thing, or more than that be a more applicable hunting technique to the state/area/terrain.

And if we call it rabbit hunting with dogs, shouldn't we call it deer hunting with dogs?

I'm not familiar at all with any states that use dogs for hunting, nor am I familiar with the laws of the land as well as the reasons why it is only used in certain areas. So that's why I'm bringing all this up, as a person ignorant about this technique for hunting deer.

In Indiana, we are now allowed to use dogs(on a leash) to help us track game for recovery purposes.

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The reason that we Hunt Deer with Dogs is for a number of reasons. For one it is how i was raised hunting in the lLake Ponchatrain swamp(Northshore side).Lots of places you could only get to by pirogue,so you would get in a stand and let the dogs do the hunting. I truly believe as a kid we did this to put meat on the table. I really remember a time when my dad trapped animals for a living in that swamp.We no longer Hunt Deer With Dogs in that swamp.... it is a state run WMA now. The bond and friendship with the other hunters is also an important factor.I still hunt also, but i look forward to getting in the woods with all my friends, with our 4wheel drives and atv's and waking up the deer with the hounds who were born to hunt. Hunting Deer with dogs only last's 3 weeks, 4weekends also, the rut starts very late here, so to get the bucks up and moving sometimes takes dogs. I do love tracking deer myself, building the shooting lanes, food plots and buying that corn.LOL And thanks for the grammar lesson!J/K I was just very excited about my all day hunts last weekend. only 3 more to go before the season ends. Good luck to all you folk's this season!!

I see now. They do not care much for us i guess.... we are in the swampy areas and use gps dog tracking collars. It is a wonderful sound hearing them light one up. I also still hunt, i would not complain if someone's hound ran a big deer in front of me. Thanks for the link to your thread. I might as well kill this thread.

We run deer a lot down here in Fl. For me just being out in the woods and getting to hear a few good races is a good day. I still hunt also, sometimes in the same areas dogs are being ran in. Nothing gets your heart pumping like a pack of dogs getting close and you start to hear the bushes crashing coming towards you.

It may be legal in some states but somehow using dogs doesn't sound fair.

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Running deer with dogs isn't as easy as some might think. It's not like every time we put the dogs out we kill a deer. Not everyone who runs dogs hunts the same way as others might do it. I admit there are some groups that will go out and have about 20 trucks to cover an area, and dump out 10-20 dogs at a time. It doesn't seem like the deer in that area would have a chance. We see that happen a lot out in the national forrest, and I don't really agree with hunting like that. It usually ends up in a mess, with most of the day spent looking for lost dogs. And honestly those guys really don't end up killing that many deer.
This is basicly how dog hunting for us goes.
Our last hunting lease we had was just a little over 36,000 acres and we would usually have about 5-6 trucks hunting in our group, some days only 2-3. Most of the guys had there own dogs, but we never put them all out at once. We take turns putting out the dogs so the ones who just hunted got a chance to rest. And it's easier to keep track of a few dogs at a time rather than a large pack. Most of the guys we hunt with have to much time and money invested into their dogs to want them lost in the woods.
So now that you have the dogs out, you wait to see if they find anything that is fresh enough for them to run. Sometimes they do, sometimes they don't. If they do find one, sometimes they will trail that track for a long time before they ever even get close enough to "jump" the deer. If the deer went a ways and bedded down it might not be that long. But sometimes those big bucks in rut will walk all night and never bed down. When we are lucky enough to get one jumped, it's a guessing game as to where that deer will run and you have to try and be in a spot before that deer gets there to get a shot at it. And with only 5-6 trucks covering a large area it's kinda hard to do sometimes. Sometimes the deer can be 5-10 minutes ahead of where you are hearing the dogs barking at. I think a lot of people that have never hunted with dogs think the deer is actually just a few feet in front of the dogs running for its life. The deer is way faster and smarter than that. So now you have spent most of the morning listening to the dogs trailing and they have just jumped the deer, and you are sure that you will be able to get a shot at it in this clearing you stopped at. You can hear the dogs getting closer and you know any minute that the deer will come out into the opening, and you will get your shot. So you shoulder your gun and guess what? Out of the woods runs a big old doe, and thats not legal to shoot. Game over and no deer.lol
I am sure there are others that run deer with dogs that can tell you the same has happened to them. It's not easy, and there are many other things that can happen to cause a race to end up with the dogs back in the box and no deer killed.
Sorry about the long rambling post, but maybe this will give some of the ones who have never dog hunted an idea of what it is like.

I have never ran deer with dogs but i have coon hunted with dogs and rabbit hunted with dogs. So here is a question. What do you shoot the deer with? Buckshot out of a shotgun? Rifle?

And how do you get the deer to even slow down enough to get a shot. If they are anything like rabbits they never slow down.

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It depends on where you are hunting. If your sitting in a large open area, grab your rifle. Some of the areas are thick with just a few spot to get off a shot so I will use the shotgun in those areas. I usually have both shotgun and rifle inthe truck for that reason.

And like I said earlier, the deer is much faster than the dogs. there are some times the dogs will be so far behind the deer that it won't be running. You would be amazed at how many times you will be sitting at a spot they use as a crossing and you will barely hear the dogs and the deer will walk out in the road and look at you. And most of the time because you don't hear the dogs, you don't think the deer is close and don't have your gun in your hand.lol Most of the big bucks are smart enough to stay a minute or two out ahead of the dogs to give itself plenty of time to think about where it's going and what it's doing.

i would never hunt that way anyway. not knocking it though. just not for me.

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It's not for everybody, and thats understandable. But i think if more people could go out and see how a group like the one I hunt with does it, less people would look down upon it. Hunting in the national forrest, I have seen a lot of the things that turn still hunters, and other people off about dog hunters. Nobody wants to be driving through the woods and see a guy standing on his dogbox with a rifle in one hand and a beer in the other, or almost get run off the road by some asshole doing 90 through the woods trying to cut off his dogs.

But with everything, you will always have the ones who ruin it for everyone else. It's the same with wheeling and offroading.

Lots of hills and fields to hunt and walk but it isn't an easy hunt.
You earn your deer.

We use our "stealth" and hunting skills to bring home the deer for the table.
Also use slug shotgun, blackpowder or bow and arrow.
No center-fire rifle.

It may be legal in some states but somehow using dogs doesn't sound fair.

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Using "stealth" sounds cool. We also still hunt deer with bow, blackpowder and shotguns. Why do they not let you use rifles? Is it because of all the corn and soybean fields in Iowa? Different strokes for different folks i guess, but i promise you that hunting deer with dogs(limited season) is fair in the areas i hunt. Most of the deer season i am a stealthy deer tracker also, only i have to wear hip boots to get where the deer are to put the venison in the freezer. We earn our deer also.

It's not for everybody, and thats understandable. But i think if more people could go out and see how a group like the one I hunt with does it, less people would look down upon it. Hunting in the national forrest, I have seen a lot of the things that turn still hunters, and other people off about dog hunters. Nobody wants to be driving through the woods and see a guy standing on his dogbox with a rifle in one hand and a beer in the other, or almost get run off the road by some asshole doing 90 through the woods trying to cut off his dogs.

But with everything, you will always have the ones who ruin it for everyone else. It's the same with wheeling and offroading.

I did for years in eastern Virginia (swampy and think under growth), but whenever i hunted in western Virginia we could not and still hunting or human drives were great methods. i did enjoy the dogs. even after the dogs had gone through it still got them up and running..